He squanders every advantage this nation has. His policies have ballooned the deficit, has damaged our standing among our allies. And he's done this with the full backing of the Republican Party.

As did the previous Republican administration.

Vote Democratic on Election Day.

I got physically ill when I saw pellets of respirators being loaded for shipment to the Puti tat. We didn't have them when we needed them, we waited to manufacture them, now we may not need them (except Alabama has only one available intensive care room/bed remaining) and they are being shipped off to Russia. There is much more need in south america than Russia.

every day when I listen to him I think to myself that this man was employed to promote the republican party and its values. But what I can’t process is that he seems so logical, human, down to earth, and normal. I know that Sarah Palin was not really his idea, but how could anyone with Any sense ally himself or herself with a party that would promote someone of such shallowness and ignorance? And yes, I understand people do things for money, but it’s very disappointing. I think we have all had friends who we liked as young people and when they became conservative we shook our heads in combination of disbelief and disgust.

Hillary. But the opposite happened .

Listening to Schmidt with Al Franken made me understand Steve Schmidt more. But i'm hoping Steve has learned to see things differently also.

From Slate:

The hype can probably be traced to the Web site of a 21-year-old college senior majoring in political science at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs.

Adam Brickley, a political buff who will graduate in May, started a “Draft Sarah Palin for Vice President” blog last year and has relentlessly promoted the idea ever since. Brickley has never been to Alaska or met Palin. But while researching potential vice presidents, he stumbled on Palin and thought she would be a good No. 2 to just about all of the major Republican candidates in the race at the time.

The “Draft Palin” movement picked up momentum in more mainstream media, including a column last summer by Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard. Others followed, including talk over the past couple weeks from conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh. [ Actually, Limbaugh’s been chatting up Palin since February 2008; Brickley created his blog in February 2007, during his junior year, a mere two months after Palin assumed the governorship. Click here to see him talk up Palin this past May on YouTube.]

Schmidt and Wilson are both cut from the same cloth. They're astute, clever and persuasive and they're both committed to conservative politics. We like them now because they're willing to help us defeat a common enemy. But neither of these guys has any interest in joining our team.

listening to him Al Franken's show he isn't that much into policy details.

He would be opposed to someone that was too far left and socialist but that's true of many Democrats also.

most likely moderate traditional conservative POLITICALLY and almost certainly (the norm for all of us) holds a range and goulash of values and positions that overlap with liberalism and especially progressivism.

As for what conservative IS, political psychologists, philosophers and historians say conservatism is above all an emotional reaction to change and differences, typically negative, without an intellectual basis to adhere to. W wasn't just woofing when he said he consulted his gut. (That's very unlike liberalism with its very old and entrenched intellectual foundations and evolution.)

Bill Buckley: "A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop..."

Abe Lincoln stated the essence of the contribution traditional conservatism brings to government. Mid-century conservative scholars like Buckley tried to create and embed in the Republican Party -- but they lost that battle and the party to the RW extremists.

"What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?"

As those like Schwartz say, they didn't change, the Republican Party left them. More specifically, those who took it over are socially and/or religiously hard-to-extreme right and also extreme right/laissez-faire/kleptocratic economically. In the process of taking the party over, they purged traditional conservative values and practices that obstructed their plans to remake America to suit them. And developed the potential for authoritarian obedience and targeting of hostility to divide and conquer the electorate.

Which brings us to today, when thoughtful conservatives like Schwartz have had to accept that the changes to the party weren't something its voters would throw off and resolve for themselves. Under extremely bad leaders, most changed too in the mass societal pathology that's developed.

For one because most Democratic spokespersons are way too timid. Too nice. Too "go high". They have moved a tad in to the riske. Nancy put out one that stung. Once in the odd moon they come out with a zinger, but then run to the closet and stay quiet again

Republicans like this are the experts at the modern day political battlefield. And know what, and how much, it takes to chip through the GOP armour.

But take advantage of them now, because as soon as the R's dump Trump, and get a "moderate" in there. Or at least someone who can fool enough people that he or she is a moderate, they will pivot so fast and turn that expertise on Democrats.

who would be a rethug through or after the Gingrich era. That stench was bad enough to make a maggot back up in disgust.

As much as I like it when Steve Schmidt takes aim at his fellow GOPers, I can't help but blurt out "YOU helped build this, Schmidt. Glad you finally saw the light, but trump was the inevitable result of people like you pushing your republi-CON policies of selfishness and thoughtlessness and greed and and short-sightedness and moneygrubbing-over-all and I-don't-wanna-pay-taxes and I-hate-the-government - for decades. THIS is the inevitable result. trump is where that leads you."

THIS is the dead end toward which that mindset and that world view both inevitably lead - when it's not managed and curbed, and all the guardrails against recklessness, myopic decision-making, and predatory priorities are torn down. You get fucking ANARCHY. And destruction. And supervision by petulant children. Like donald. I wish it only led YOU there. And NOT all the rest of us, too. Voters and leaders and political strategists and schemers and manipulators like you built this and packaged it all phony and tinsel-covered with fancy lights and catchy music and slick production values. And while all you care about is the rich and privileged and the already-haves and turn your nose up at the truly needy - you know, the ones who Jesus talked about in the church services you may go to, mostly to be seen there, but don't really listen to or learn anything from - YOU helped build this. It has YOUR name on it.

It has EVERY republi-CON's name on it. And others', too. Such as every apologist who somehow found reason to stay home and not support the Democrat who led the ticket, advocates for other splinter or sore-loser or alternative candidates; and those who insisted on the perfect and to hell with anything less than that; and complainers who snivel that "they're all alike" so they'll just write somebody in because it doesn't make any difference since they're all alike. I would hope, by now, it would be abundantly clear - they're NOT alike. Not by a LONG shot.

GOPers sneer at the elderly - in fact, some of them like Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick even have the gall to say older people have an obligation to die so the rest of us can have a good economy. Defund programs for the poor, needy, and hungry - you know, the ones you call "lazy moochers." They don't want to fund programs that actually help people in need - because it's better to give more money and tax breaks to big business, corporations, and the super rich who can afford to chip in a little bit more for the benefit of the greater good - AND the roads and bridges that they drive on, too. And the crumbling infrastructure THEY use and benefit from, too. And if they're more able to pay a little more because they can afford it, why the hell shouldn't they?

And don't tell me how charitable you are because you support the ballet. Not when you should be sending that money down to Skid Row where people desperately need it. And I say that as a Fine Arts major in college.

And to people like those on "The Breakfast Club" where Biden got a little carried away - you're seriously gonna fixate on THAT???? And then start picking Biden apart??? When the closest thing to Satan straight from the bowels of Hell is running to keep the White House? And you're STILL gonna quibble and make a mountain out of a whitehead on the side of your nose? When you've got the world's biggest and softest and most deserving-to-be-dumped and most colossally toxic and vile and infectious and racist and sexist and deceitful and destructive target (I'm talking' to YOU Sam Seder, and YOU Zerlina Maxwell), dammit, whose side are you on? And who do you REALLY want to see sliced up and weakened and beaten up, and who do you REALLY want to win this in November (even when, not if, he cheats again)?

I don't want to hear ANYBODY'S excuses about why Biden isn't immaculate enough or not perfect enough to vote for this fall. Recalling the phrase that pays - in the book "The Electric Kool-aid Acid Test" about Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters, "are you ON the bus, or OFF the bus?"

And are you still going to hold out for only the perfect and reject the merely good/practical/workable? News flash: "Perfect" isn't. It doesn't even exist.

And it comes down to a very simple binary choice: do you really want to get rid of trump? OR DON'T YOU?

-Laelth

We can't afford for any of them to escape persecution.

ratfucking do matter...

from his fellow republicans.

Democrats really should think about hiring one, with the general election coming up and all.

ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING that helps rid us of the turd, I will gladly accept.

I DO, however, have a memory. And it is long (at least until the ALZ/dementia kicks in...).

I will remember what Steve Schmidt, Michael Steele, Nicole Wallace, Rick Wilson, ALL the Rs or former Rs, have enabled, who have now seen the light after helping to create a system that has brought us the sorriest piece of human excrement to EVER inhabit the White House, one who REVELS in his ignorance, greed, prejudice and hate.

The question is what will they do once he is gone? Will they return to the fold that CREATED him?

I can't fathom why having a D behind your name is so abhorrent.

It seems like a big issue is the size of government. Well, for BIG issues, like equality under the law, fairness that addresses all states, national security, it will take a BIG government. For big issues like providing health care, education, infrastructure, a safe environment, it will take a big government.

Paying taxes seem to be an issue. Nobody likes paying taxes, but TANSTAAFL (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch) is a reality that everyone must accept. NO ONE likes freeloaders. Anyone who accepts the benefits that taxes provide, then complains about paying them, is a wannabe freeloader. Besides, a SHITLOAD TON of those taxes goes to the military industrial complex for our NATIONAL SECURITY. Those haters of paying taxes LOVE their money being spent on THAT.

Guns aren't the issue. That is a fake issue designed to stir shit. Democrats do NOT want to take away everyone's guns. WE DEMOCRATS OWN GUNS!!! A concept that they don't seem to consider in the upcoming "culture war". Weapons of WAR, however, MAY not be appropriate for personal safety, or sport hunting. That can be discussed without conflating it as democrats "taking all your guns".

As is said, you can always tell a lot about a person by the company they keep. Look at the people who are lining up behind the republican party. Haters of EVERY stripe... Nazis, white nationalists, so-called christian fundamentalists/evangelicals, haters of the others (jews, muslims, blacks, ANY immigrant except white ones, homos, any non-christian), etc. THAT is enough to cause ANY politician to be ashamed to have an R behind their name.

Bottom line, the D stands for fairness, equality, inclusion, acceptance, sympathy and empathy, religious freedom, etc.

The R stands for hate, division, INequality, religious extremism, being anti-science, anti-regulation for profit, greed, etc.

Why would anyone want to be identified as an R. (Rhetorical question, we all know HATE of the other is the common thread...)

I just don't get it. Yes, we all have our differences, but I will NEVER countenance a republican as a friend, or someone I WANT to be part of my life. I will NOT be judged for KNOWINGLY having THEM in my personal circle. I can't remove them all from the earth, so we may have to associate or interact at some level.

But that is one option for choice that is COMPLETELY under my control. A republican will NEVER be more than someone that I HAVE to associate or interact with. I do NOT want to spend time with them, share with them, have them a part of my life. That little R behind their political affiliation is a deal breaker, a red line in the sand, a bridge too far, the straw the breaks the camel's back, etc. You get my drift. Limiting? Yes, but I will deal with it.

is gone

maybe they might become Republican again if it's mostly people like Romney mccain the late senator lugar etc. who run the party but not as it is now.

...and if some sane conservatives, who still believe in liberal democracy, want to join us in the American equivalent of the English Glorious Revolution of 1688--when Whigs and Tories joined together to rid themselves of a tyrant--then good for them. Maybe afterwards, the GOP might come to believe in liberal democracy again--it certainly doesn't now--and we can have a period of "normal" politics again.

still_one!

We are making a grave mistake if we dont tie republicans firmly to him.